Case Number 20276

DIARY OF A MAD BLACK WOMAN (BLU-RAY)

The Charge

Get ready to meet a real straight shooter.

Opening Statement

The movie that started Tyler Perry down the road to becoming a one-man film
industry comes to Blu-ray.

Facts of the Case

Charles (Steve Harris, 12 Rounds) and Helen (Kimberly Elise, For
Colored Girls) are by all appearances the perfect couple. Appearances in
this case are deceiving. Through her diaries, Helen reveals that their
eighteen-year marriage has been a loveless sham for years. Charles is distant
and cruel and, what's more, has a girlfriend on the side. When Charles coldly
kicks Helen out of the house, she takes refuge with her grandmother, Madea
(Tyler Perry, Madea Goes to Jail). With the help of a kind man and a cast
of oddball characters, Helen learns some powerful life lessons and discovers
inner strength she never knew she had.

The Evidence

Coming into this movie, I was completely unfamiliar with Tyler Perry's work.
I know that, since this film, he has become a wildly successful writer/director.
Other than that, the extent of my familiarity with his work boils down to the
fact that I saw his cameo in Star Trek. So, Diary of a Mad Black
Woman. is my first taste of Perry. What an odd movie this is.

I will say this for the film, it went a couple of places I was not
expecting. About ten minutes in, I figured I could write the script in my mind
before it actually happened. You've seen all this before -- the dutiful wife,
the heel of a husband, the slutty girlfriend and so on. However, once Charles
cruelly ejects Helen from their shared home, Helen's grandmother Madea enters
the film. Destined to live on in numerous future Perry movies, Madea is at once
this movie's most insipid and inspired creation.

What to make of the pistol brandishing, foul tempered, borderline criminal
Madea? She seems transplanted from another film. The best I can describe her is
as some strange hybrid of Flip Wilson's Geraldine character and Aunt Esther from
Sanford and Son. At the beginning, this film seemed content to simplify
and stereotype its characters along the lines of most other melodramatic romcoms
or weepers. Then Madea takes the movie in an odd direction. Is this necessarily
a bad thing? I wish I could answer that. She seems to be Tyler Perry's unique
version of a Greek chorus channeling the director's more slapstick and lowbrow
impulses. I'll say this for the Madea character, I certainly didn't see her
coming.

Diary of a Mad Black Woman comes to Blu-ray with a better than
expected 1080p image. Colors are strong while preserving a film-like appearance.
The TrueHD DTS 5.1 sound is a tame affair as expected for a movie of this type.
The surrounds are almost never engaged and the low end is there to enhance the
film's music, and that's about it. Much more respectable is a pretty generous
set of extras. There are two commentaries: one featuring Tyler Perry and another
director Darren Grant (Make it Happen) and Kimberly Elise. A healthy dose
of featurettes covering the making of the film, Tyler Perry's history, and the
city of Atlanta give plenty of film background. Deleted scenes of negligible
quality also round out the set. All in all, you get a fairly comprehensive set
of extras that should give die-hard fans a good bang for the buck.

This movie attempts to be many things and, in overextending itself, doesn't
seem to do any of them particularly well. Somewhere in this jumble of Christian
morality, slapstick comedy, lowbrow humor, female empowerment and jilted woman
revenge fantasy I'm sure there is a good movie (or several) waiting to get out.
As it stands, this is just a mess.

The Rebuttal Witnesses

This movie is not without its charms. The uniformly likable cast does what
the material asks of them admirably. This earnest story with its themes of
faith, family and forgiveness has a positive, life-affirming message. In what
can be of flood of cynicism emerging from Hollywood, you can see why audiences
looking for a drop or two of uplift would embrace this movie.

Closing Statement

This mystifying blend of lowbrow sketch comedy and overblown drama really
doesn't work (not for me anyway). For a great many devoted Tyler Perry fans, it
seems to be just what the doctor ordered. All I can say is that you probably
need to watch for yourself to decide whether it's your cup of tea.